


Unions and Ambastards

by Beth Harker (Beth_Harker)



Category: Newsies (1992)
Genre: Gen, Incomplete, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-30
Updated: 2017-05-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 11:19:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17223062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beth_Harker/pseuds/Beth%20Harker
Summary: Boots wants the union to outlast the strike, but first he needs to figure out what that means, and who will help him. David is going back to school, Jack is fighting his own demons, and Spot Conlon is as much an enigma as ever.





	Unions and Ambastards

Before the strike, Boots had never thought that Thursday night poker games in Brooklyn would become his routine. He had David to thank for it, or David to blame. At any rate, it as all David’s fault. David had been the one, in the post strike afterglow, to remind Jack that a single accomplishment did not, and should not, mean the end of their union. It was Jack who’d reminded everybody else, amplifying David’s words as he had been doing the whole way through, albeit just a little more now reluctantly than he had in the past. Most of the guys were still high on their triumph from the strike, but Jack had become distant and subdued.

Boots didn’t understand it. For him, the first flush of victory hadn’t worn off. He was itchy, ready to do something more. When David started talking about sending “emissaries” to the other boroughs, Boots ignored Jack was telling him it was a bad idea. Boots also ignored the other boys, who hemmed and hawed and shuffled. Mush had suggested that they’d be a union forever, without having to travel all over the city, as long as they all promised to remain friends, but Boots had known in his heart that having a union was more than just hanging out with a group of buddies. Shakily at first, and then with more certainty, Boots had put up his hand, and volunteered to take on the most intimidating borough of them all. And he had. He’d done it. He was a real live diplomat now. That was what striking had done to him.

Boots looked at it as a third job. He sold papers, he polished shoes, and then he marched across the Brooklyn Bridge each week, screamed over the edge for luck, and arrived on the other side, with a marble or a bottle cap in his pocket as a peace offering. He looked at it as a job, and he managed it as a job. The two cents that he bet in the poker game every week were a business expense rather than a gamble. He’d pretend to drink a little of the whiskey that got passed around, touching the bottle to his closed lips until they burnt, even as the smell of it made him grimace, because that was a part of the arrangement as much as the game was. He was real professional all the way through.

Besides, it was almost fun. There was something to it, sitting on the grimy ground up on the roof of the Brooklyn lodging house, with seven or eight other guys who were starting to become familiar. There was Roadsy, who was tall and lean, with black skin like Boots, who had once gotten Boots to come by early one night so that he could teach him how to shuffle cards and stop losing every hand so badly. Roadsy collected maps, and always laughed at his own jokes.

Then there was Sweetheart, who Spot said was the most trustworthy person to ever exist. Sweetheart had a way of leaning in too close when he was talking to people, and he mixed up his words, but the things he said were always nice. Nobody cheated him at cards, even though it would have been easy to do. Nobody was afraid of him, either, never mind that he towered above them all, and must have been the heaviest kid Boots had ever seen.

Another poker night regular was Dutchy. It wasn’t the same Dutchy as the one at Duane Street. This Dutchy was a girl, and she was German, not Dutch. She had curly brown hair, that she braided sometimes, and hands that seemed a little too big for her body. She always smelled like salami, and once spent half an hour talking about her _schatz_ , who had bought her a pair of “hand shoes”.

From the roof, with these people, Boots got used to seeing the sunset over the Brooklyn Bridge. He got used to swapping stories, and talking about the differences in how the World covered breaking news, compared to the Brooklyn Eagle (the Brooklyn kids, of course, insisted that their newspaper was better). Boots got used to explaining things to Sweetheart, and helping him tie his shoes, which he always forgot to do. He got used to not calling Dutchy m'am, and to accepting Roadsy’s kindness and advice.

Boots was a pretty adaptable kid. He prided himself on that. He got used to a lot of things, but Spot Conlon wasn’t one if them.

—–

In October, David got the news that he was going back to school. His father’s hand was about as good as it was going to get. Boots wanted to be happy for him, but David himself didn’t look happy. He bought his customary hundred papes on his last day of selling, but when the day was over, Boots met him at the distribution center, where he was returning almost half the pile.

“Bad day?” Boots asked casually. The headline had been about a rabies outbreak in the feral cat population around the city, and Boots’ own papes had gone fast.

David grimaced, and leaned against the distribution office. “Bad selling strategy.”

“Hey, at least you don’t gotta eat your losses, like we used to. You worked really hard for that. All us did. You gonna ring the bell or what?”

“Um… yeah.” David ran his hand up through his hair, squared his shoulders like someone about to face a great trial, and rang the bell. The old man who worked the center was nicer than Weasel had ever been, but even he grumbled when he saw just how much David was giving back to him. Boots felt bad for David, especially when the guy muttered something about new kids who didn’t know what they were doing.

“He don’t know who any of us is,” Boots said. “He mixes up Mush and Blink on the regular, and he thinks my name is Socks.”

“It’s fine,” David said. “I mean, I guess I am new at selling still. How long did it take you before you started to feel like an old hand?”

“An hour? Maybe less. You grow old fast in this business.”

David nodded. He glanced back at the distribution office, too wistful for somebody who was just waiting to get his money back. Eventually the old man handed him his coins, and he pocketed them. As he walked away, Boots fell into step with him.

“Where’s Jack?” Boots had rarely seen David without him.

“Sulking, no doubt.”

Boots paused. “I won’t ask,” he said carefully. “It ain’t polite to pry into people’s personal matters. If you got time to talk, though, I’ve been wondering some things about union business.”

“Yeah?” Normally David perked right up whenever anybody started to talk about the union, most especially when Boots did, because he was one of the few people who still took it seriously. He sort of had to, considering he continued to play a key role.

“Are you and me still meeting to talk about it? When you ain’t in classes, I mean.”

“I suppose if there _is_ union business…” David trailed off. In all honesty, there hadn’t been much in the way of union business lately. Boots couldn’t remember the last time he’d even mentioned the union to the Brooklyn kids, but that wasn’t always the point. The day to day business of being a diplomat wasn’t about getting things done, so much as it was about keeping communication open, and proving you were serious enough to keep showing up.

“You’ve gotta keep showing up,” Boots said out loud. “I mean that, Mouth. It’s your responsibility now.”

“Would it be stupid to say it’s a relief to hear that?”

“No stupider than hanging around with the likes of us on a daily basis, and you already do that. Most student types would take one whiff of Snipeshooter and go running for the hills.”

“Right,” David said, just a bit quieter. “Student types. You wanna come to my house for dinner, Boots? Talk about union business?”

Boots stopped dead in his tracks, but only for a second.

“Sounds good,” he said, like it was as casual as going to Tibby’s for a seltzer. Boots had never been to David’s place, but he guessed his role in the union was going to take him to many places in his life, and he needed to be prepared for that.

——-

It had been three years since Boots had last been in a house. Well, at least the kind of house that families lived in. He wasn’t a stranger to walls and roofs, just mothers and fathers. In his heyday he’d had an aunt. He still had a locket with her picture, which he kept in his pocket at all times. He was half tempted to pull it out, to show the Jacobses that he’d had somebody to teach him manners once, and they didn’t have to worry about him wiping his chin on the table cloth, or talking with his mouth full. Aunt Euphemeria would never forgive him for that.

It was the locket that Boots grasped quietly when Mrs. Jacobs started to scold David for having a friend over on a school night, and a very important one at that. He ran his finger over the clasp as Mr. Jacobs argued that there would be plenty of school nights, and David should be allowed to have friends over as long as he did all of his work, and didn’t stay up late. This was of some comfort to Boots, who was trying his best not to fidget, or look around the apartment like he was lost.

“It’s not you,” Sarah took a moment to whisper. “Davey’s tried every way he knows to get out of going.” Boots watched as she set the table, with one bowl for each family member, and another for him.

“Why wouldn’t he want to go?” Boots whispered back, but Sarah just pursed her lips, leaving Boots to wonder if she was keeping her brother’s secrets, or disagreed with his reasons.

“Yesterday he said…” Les started to pipe up, but Sarah silenced him with a look.

In the corner of the kitchen, Mrs. Jacobs was saying something quietly to David. The annoyance and affection in her stance may have made Boots uncomfortable even if she wasn’t most likely talking about him. She gave David a little shake, and tugged at his hair before seeming to free him. Then she took over the soup from her husband, who had already been ladling it into bowls.

“I hope you like rye bread,” Sarah said brightly. “One if the girls at work makes it better than anybody else, and she owed me a favor, so…” she disappeared into the kitchen, just as David and Mr. Jacobs came to the table.

The soup was pleasantly sour, and the bread was crusty. The broth had been made with chicken feet, precisely two of them, which Boots knew because only he and Les had received one in their bowls. Some of the little kids at the lodging house liked to go junking for scraps after the Sunday afternoon market, and make a bonfire afterwards to cook what they found. If nothing else, Boots had to admit that Mrs. Jacobs cooked feet better than they did, and didn’t play stupid games with them at the table. Mr. Jacobs smiled at Boots, and asked him questions about work, and the shoe shine business. Boots wished that David would say something to him.

Ten minutes into the meal, Jack climbed in the balcony window.

“You just let him do that?” Boots blurted out, before he could stop himself. Sarah hid her face in her hands to try and hide her smile, but David put down his spoon, and stood up to go to the window. Within a moment, David was out on the balcony, and Jack was being pulled along with him.

“Don’t worry mama,” Sarah said, as the window shut. “Everybody is coming over to celebrate David’s triumphant return to academia.”

“And learning,” Boots added. He looked at the window, then back at the table. He swirled his soup around a couple of times with his spoon. Could he go outside, or was this some kind of Jack and David conversation that he wasn’t invited to? Was that what he got, after coming all the way to the Jacobs house, and putting something that still had toenails in his mouth?

Sarah made the decision for him. She rose, tugging at Boots’ sleeve. “We won’t leave the fire escape,” she promised. “And we’ll be back inside before half an hour is up. Bright and early, yes?”

If the Jacobs parents had any objections to the meeting, they were lost in Mrs. Jacobs’ harried attempts to at least keep Les indoors.

———

Jack and David were deep in conference by the time Boots clamored out after Sarah. Neither of them looked happy. Jack wore a hard expression, and David seemed on the edge of something. They stood close, David’s hand gripping the railing of the fire escape just near Jack’s elbow, while Jack’s arms hung stiffly at his sides.

“Guess this ain’t a private party no more,” Jack said.

“I…” David looked at Sarah and Boots, then shut his mouth abruptly. Sarah put her hand on his shoulder, frowning. Boots cast a longing glance towards the window. He could go back inside and play marbles with Les, if the Jacobs parents let him, or else he could just cut his losses and head back to the lodge.

“Boots came over to talk about union business,” David said, and all options for escape dissipated.

“Oh?” Jack made the word sound more like a sneer than polite interest. Even so, Boots nodded.

“I did,” Boots said. He wasn’t sure what he was dealing with, but he wasn’t going to pretend that he’d come by just to mooch a free meal.

“Then let’s talk about the union,” Sarah said sternly. Jack looked from David, and then to Boots. He wasn’t glaring at both of them, Boots noticed, only David. Jack might be angry, but it wasn’t directed at him.

“How do you see it, Boots?” Jack asked.

“I see that no one’s doing much for it these days.”

“You are,” said David. “You’ve been in and out of Brooklyn all this time. That wouldn’t have happened before.”

Jack barked out a sound somewhere between a scoff and a laugh. “Ask Racetrack about that.”

“I ain’t doing it to gamble,” Boots tried to explain, even though he was technically gambling over there. The gambling wasn’t the reason he made the trip, at least.

“Why are you doing it?” Sarah prompted. She sounded hopeful.

“Someone has to, or else…”

“There we have it!” Jack clapped Boots on the shoulder. “Someone has to. A newsie whose willing to stand up for all the other newsies.”

“What’re you trying to say?” Involuntarily, Boots felt his hands clenching. It wasn’t Jack’s words that were the problem, but the way he spat out “newsie” as if it were an insult.

“He’s trying to promote you to union leader, because he’s too selfish and cowardly to do it himself,” David said.

“Exactly.” Jack’s eyes narrowed, his voice as cold as a bleak February day. “And because you ain’t a newsie no more as of a couple hours ago.”

“As you can tell, my interests are those of the ruling elite,” David said. “I’m a step away from becoming the next Pulitzer. Tomorrow in advanced algebra I’ll be learning new and innovative ways to cheat the rest of you. With math! And… and writing. That’s what composition classes are for.”

David turned away, both hands landing on the railing. Jack reached out like he would touch him, then stopped.

“You wanna get outta here, Boots?” Jack asked.

“I wanna know what you two’s talking about,” Boots said. He couldn’t lead the union. That much was certain. And he didn’t suppose Jack and David meant for him to, either. They were fighting, and he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, was all.

“Walk with me, and I’ll tell you everything you need to know,” Jack promised. “I’ll give you pointers. Good ones. How’s that sound?”

Boots shook his head.

“You should probably go, actually,” said David. “It’s getting late. My parents will be knocking on the window any second.”

As if on cue, Mayer Jacobs tapped on the window.

“David, it’s time for bed.”

“See?” David shrugged apologetically. As he let go on the railing, Boots could see clearly, even in the dark, how his hands were shaking.

“I’ll see you around,” Boots told David weakly. To Jack he said that he’d meet him at the bottom of the fire escape. Sarah looked just about ready to spring on him, and Boots didn’t want to be in the position of having to try and defend Jack from a girl, especially not one who probably had just cause to be angry.

——-

“Y'know, I didn’t tell him any of that stuff, about being elite and scabbing out he rest of us in algebra. Dave made that leap all on his own.” Jack took out his cigarette pack, and adjusted his cowboy hat. It took him a good five tries to strike a match and light up.

“Seems you told him plenty enough.”

“You saying I’m the bad guy here?” Jack demanded. Suddenly, Boots felt very much like the thirteen year old kid that he was, as if the four years between him and Jack could just as easily have been centuries. During the strike, it seemed, he’d gone from being one of the younger kids, playing with Tumbler and Snipeshooter, into being one of the older ones. It happened to everyone eventually. One day you did something, the others noticed, and you stopped being one of the ones that they needed to protect, and changed into someone whith responsibility. Sometimes that something was just growing taller, but if height was the only requirement, then Boots guessed that Racetrack would be doomed to repeat his infancy forever.

The question hung in the air between them. Sometimes Boots did feel like Jack’s peer, but right now he didn’t want to be. There was something to Jack and David and the way that they interacted with each other, something vast that Boots didn’t feel qualified to talk about.

“I’m not saying anything,” Boots told Jack, and hoped that he would leave it at that. He didn’t.

“He don’t wanna go back to school,” Jack said. “You ever heard anything as dumb as that?”

Boots shrugged. “You both sounded pretty dumb up there when you was trying to name me union leader.”

“About that…”.

“Were you serious, or just using me in your stupid fight, ‘cause I happened to show up?”

“You want me to be serious? 'Cause this can be as serious as you want to be. The sky’s the limit, Boots.” As Jack gestured into the distance, his cigarette drew a line of smoke across the air.

“I want you to do your job. There’s people that’s counting on you.”

“I already did it, Boots. The strike’s won, ain’t it?”

“There’s more,” Boots insisted.

“Like what?”

Boots licked his lips, caught off guard by the question, and by the sheer enormity of things he wanted.

“Get back to me when you or anybody else figures out the answer,” Jack said. “And I’ll see what i can do.”

“And in the meantime?”

“Next time you’re in Brooklyn, talk to Spot. See what he thinks. Thing with Spot is, if you don’t demand nothin’ of him, he’ll string you along forever. He’ll learn all your secrets, real quiet like, and never give you anything in return.”

“And what do you think he’ll do if I start demanding stuff.”

Jack grinned. “That, Boots, depends on how much he likes you.”


End file.
